Was I too harsh?

I am an atheist who has made the decision to be as educated as possible about my choice. I listen to debates, I am in the process of reading the bible and I read all that I can concerning both sides of the debate.

At the point that I am at in life, I could lose a lot of relationships should I actively come out as an atheist, but I am upfront and honest in every way and generally bring up my beliefs (or lack thereof) only when asked. One point that I take pride in is using my knowledge of the twisted logic of the bible against those who push it hard so that they are between a rock and a hard place when trying to force people to obey the will God while conveniently ignoring the verses that aren't appealing to them.

I have a friend whose sister I am vaguely acquainted with, and who I ended up being friends on Facebook with. She is a devout believer who regularly posts logic-defying statements on Facebook in which she often makes up facts out of thin air on topics such as abortion, celibacy, and gay marriage (not even researching for the "facts" that the religious community has come to support) and quoting scripture, sometimes in support of these posts, and sometimes by itself. Until now I have made counter arguments on many of these posts but staying entirely within the realm of provable facts (hard numbers with references or links to full speeches from which she has posted snippets taken out of context to show her view).

Recently she posted that she was thinking about getting a tattoo and since she is planning on heading to the holy land to convert Jewish people to Christianity she also mused as to whether or not the theme of her desired tattoo would be offensive to the Jewish people. My only response (my first foray with her in the biblical realm) was to reference Leviticus 19:28, which was god expressly forbidding tattoos (KJV - "Ye shall not make any cuttings in your flesh for the dead, nor print any marks upon you: I am the LORD.")

I felt that this was a reasonable point to make to someone who claimed to live her life by the bible and who thinks others should do the same. Unfortunately her response was to ignore my comment completely and delete me as a friend.

While I revel in the fact that I was able to rile her up using her own logic, I am saddened that rather than being able to continue a debate, the relationship was completely severed. She is a young adult and while her mind is pretty well set, I think it could do her some good to hear another view point.

I would like to hear your responses as to whether you think my response was too harsh, especially if you have another response you think may have been better. Is it better to keep the conversation going and chip away a bit at a time for the chance at changing a mind, or should you let your view be known loud and proud regardless of the reaction?

I would say that you were miles away from being harsh. You called her out with her own Bible, and she was simply to immature to actually continue the conversation. Instead she just ran away on ignored you. Out of sight, out of mind...

Don't be sad. Those are the types of relationships you should want severed. I've lost 10+ friends on Facebook the last two weeks or so alone, including my uncle. How do i look at it? Fuck em. If they want to be ignorant and brainwashed, i don't want them around anyway. You didn't do anything wrong at all, and you were extremely, extremely far from "harsh". You were nothing but honest.

I have to agree, that was not at all harsh. I've had to learn the hard way that fundies just can't handle truth when in comes to their scripture or world view. I go out of my way to avoid any religious discussions with them. Sad, but it keeps the peace.

She sounds like a loon. If you think about it: one person believing what she believes would draw immediate attention from the psychiatry wing of your local hospital. At a collective level we call this religion.

A religious nut on my Facebook recently posted "Do what you can do, and God will do what you can not". Of course my reaction was to ask "So does that mean god can lick my elbow?"A few minutes later I'd been removed as a friend. Fortunately my Muslim friend stepped in to 'set me straight' with his backwards answers! :)

"liberal christians" love to pick & choose what they want from the book.

my favorite response is that it either IS or IS NOT the word of god.

if it is, why, as a christian, do you not follow every word as law?

at least these crazy fundies are at least trying to live by the word, as opposed

to the who just use christianity as a social club.

i think you could have possibly approached your FB "friend" by stating that you hoped she wasn't making a mistake by considering a tattoo, since the bible does make a clear stand against defiling our "temple" & then using your scripture quote as proof you were only concerned for her future peace of mind, once she was aware of her gods restrictions.

I think you did a great job. It's what I would have done. I do notice though, that most xtians who know just a little bit about the Bible are armed with one disclaimer. Any quotation from the Old Testament is automatically negated by Christ dying on the cross. "He was the final sacrafice" they will tell you, "so we don't have to live by the 'Old Laws' anymore. Just live by Christ's word."

How do you usually combat that? (I just usually raise my eyebrows, nod and say, Ohhhhhhhhh) I'd really rather push back. Anyone?